The men all stood as she approached the table, and once they were seated again, Postmaster Arndt began the introductions. Anna was nearly overcome by the scent of cigars—three of them—in addition to Mr. Arndt’s pipe. The scent of tobacco was something she ordinarily enjoyed, but the air was so thick with smoke above the table that she felt as though she were looking at the men through a foggy window.

“This is our mayor,” Mr. Arndt said, motioning toward the man to her left. “Sterling Sykes.”

Mayor Sykes was as short as Mr. Arndt was tall. He had thinning hair, the color of which might have been blond or gray—it was impossible to tell through the haze of smoke. “Welcome to Edenton, Miss Dale,” he said. “I hope you met with no problems on that long drive south?”

“None at all.” She thought of mentioning how much she’d enjoyed seeing country that was new to her, but if anything, she needed to downplay her unfamiliarity with the territory. Her main problem on the journey had been that it gave her too much time to think about her mother. Too much time to wonder how she could have handled things differently. “I stayed overnight in Richmond to break up the journey,” she added.

Mr. Arndt motioned to another man, this one of medium height with black, greased-back hair, a ruddy complexion, and deep bags beneath his eyes, despite the fact that he couldn’t have been more than forty. “And this is the editor of the Chowan Herald, Billy Calhoun,” Mr. Arndt said.

“How do you do,” she said, thinking: A grown man named Billy?

“You’re a pretty one,” Billy said. “And don’t you have the look of an avant-garde New York artist. All you need is one of them long cigarette holders, ain’t that right?”

She tried not to wince at the word “ain’t” spilling so easily from the mouth of a newspaperman. And avant-garde? Unconsciously, she touched her bob. She rather liked that description of herself.

“I do own one of those cigarette holders,” she confessed with a smile. She did. A gift from a former beau, but she never used it. She would have felt silly.

She moved her gaze to the fourth man at the table.

“I’m Toby Fiering, manager of the cotton mill,” he said. He was soft-spoken, his voice buttery and warm. Early fifties, thick gray hair, light blue eyes, and a genuine-looking smile. All in all, a handsome older man. “Why isn’t a pretty girl like you married?” he asked, knocking her off balance with the question, although she’d certainly been asked it more than once. “You’re not one of them divorcées, are you?”

Anna shook her head, her smile forced. “Just haven’t met the right fella,” she said, truthfully. “And I want to focus on being an artist.”